Wednesday, October 30: With New Testament, we went to Priscilla's Catacombs. My teacher had given me a warning ahead of time that I didn't have to go in since I am sometimes claustrophobic. So I was pretty nervous to go on this visit, but I am glad I did. It was definitely not as bad as my teacher made it seem. We walked through a lot of carved out spaces where the dead bodies of thousands of Italians used to lie. It was not as creepy or anxiety-inducing as I thought it would be. The highlight was seeing some bones in the tombs but they were only in one area. Otherwise, I would say I was under-impressed with this visit.
That night, we went to the Opera with our program. It was called Turandot and all I learned was that it is set in China and the main male character has to solve riddles in order to be with the woman that he loves, otherwise he will die. Everything was in Italian and our seats were not the greatest so we decided to leave halfway through the second act (out of three acts). The opera building was really beautiful and intricate and I am glad that I am able to say I attended an Italian opera. After ditching, Rachel and I got pizza at a good place called Pizza Re before heading home to pack for Venice.
Italian Opera
Selfie from our little balcony room
Caprese Pizza at Pizza Re
Thursday, October 31: Happy Halloween! First year that I didn't dress up in some way for Halloween which is pretty sad. But I went to VENICE which is pretty cool. We had to get up really early in order to catch our 6:50 train. By 10:30, we had arrived in Venice. For this trip, I traveled with Rachel and two boys from my program. It was so cool to finally arrive somewhere that I have always wanted to visit. But I always thought I would be with family. I could just imagine my dad giving me all the info about the history of Venice. Wish he was there!
We first found the hotel and dropped off our bags. Then, we were really hungry so we found what we thought was a good deal at a restaurant with free WiFi. It actually ended up to be pretty gross (worst carbonara I have had in Italy) so we were pretty disappointed. After lunch, we made our way to St. Mark's Square. Along the way, we stopped in a lot of shops which all pretty much had the same things. Masks and Murano glass are the two big things in Venice. At St. Mark's Square, we took the infamous gondola ride. It started off really nice and it was very cool to go through these small paths of water. Then, one of the boys we were with felt so sick that he said he needed to get off the boat right away. We were a little confused and we told him to just wait it out but he was adamant about getting off the boat. At first, our guide didn't really understand but he finally realized that Andrew really wanted to get off. We were all dying laughing as Andrew threw his sweatshirt over the rail and dramatically jumped over the rail. I will never forget this boat ride. Later, we went up a clock tower and saw a really pretty view of the whole city, which is a lot smaller than I thought it would be. After walking around and going in a lot more of the same shops, we went to dinner at an okay place right on the water. We all got seafood which was good but nothing special. And something that was really rude was that the waiter brought us our check without asking if we wanted dessert. Then, after we had paid and were still sitting at the table talking for just five minutes, the waiter came over and asked us to leave because other people were waiting. SO RUDE!
Venice!
Gondola Ride
Rachel and I going under a bridge
View from Clock Tower
Overall, the two bad things about Venice were that we had two full days there when we only needed one and the food really was not that great because everything is so tourist-y. One cool thing about Halloween though is that a lot of the kids dressed up. As early as 12 noon, kids wore costumes and walked into all of the shops where they got candy from the shopkeepers. It was funny that the kids go into shops for candy, instead of going into houses.
Friday, November 1: I can't believe it's already November! We woke up in Venice and had the weird hotel breakfast before heading out to do pretty much the same thing we did Thursday. The boys went back to St. Mark's Square but Rachel and I stayed close to the hotel/train station. We pretty much went into every single shop we passed in order to kill time before our midnight train ride. We went into the Church of St. Lucia which the train station is named after. We found the Jewish Ghetto which was pretty interesting. And that was pretty much all we did. For lunch, I had another disappointing meal even though I tried to play it safe by getting a margherita pizza. Later, we went to a bakery for a snack and got treats that looked way better than they actaully tasted. So for dinner, we caved and got McDonald's because we did not want to risk getting another bad meal.
Saturday, November 2: We finally got on our train at midnight so we could head back to Rome. That train ride was definitely an experience. We were on a night train that reminded me of Harry Potter where six people were in rooms with a door that closes and the lights out. Luckily, Rachel and I were in the same room. The train ride took 6 hours because it wasn't high-speed and it made a lot of stops along the way. I tried to sleep but I kept waking up every hour. At one point, the girl across from me got off the train, so I propped my legs up on her open seat. I guess I fell asleep and the next thing I knew, this man was sitting across from me and trying to push my legs aside. I immediatly dropped them but I think he felt bad and he wanted me to keep them there even while he was sitting. He was (pretty agressively) grabbing my legs and trying to put them back up on the chair but I kept declining. Pretty awkward because he was rambling in Italian. I kept saying "No! It's okay!" but he would not budge for a long time. And of course, Rachel is in the corner dying laughing. The guy looked at her like "what is going on with this girl?" It was pretty funny. I finally said "English" as he was rambling that I should prop my feet back up and then, he FINALLY gave up. The rest of the ride was pretty awkward.
I was very happy to get back to my own bed in Rome at 6:40 this morning. I threw some laundry in and then slept until 1:30 pm. Got some exercise in by running to the Castel of St. Angelo. Then, I was able to meet my roommate Michelle's parents and youngest sister. They were really nice and took us out for a great dinner by our apartment. Just now, I also met Danielle's parents, who were also very nice. It's really cool to see how people's parents and families are similar to them and to hear their stories from their sightseeing and traveling.
So, overall, it was a pretty weird weekend but I am glad that I was able to see Venice, a place that has always been really intriguing to me.
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